Chapter 1 #2
Yes, there was no doubt in her mind that something than a hurricane was headed her way.
Yes, it was keeping her up at night, making her cranky, and pretty much disrupting every area of her life.
But that didn’t mean she couldn’t figure it out for herself or needed help.
No. No way. No how. Nope, not gonna do it.
She was not going to ask her grandma for a ‘forecast’.
She would figure it out all by herself. She would stare at her coffee for a month of Sundays if that’s what it took.
“And it looks like it might take even longer,” she sighed to the empty room.
Picking up the teaspoon from the napkin where she’s placed it, Tamsyn dipped it back into the coffee and gave the brown liquid a single stir for what seemed like the umpteenth time.
Letting the teaspoon drop from her fingertips, she exhaled when the gentle ting-a-ling of silver hitting ceramic filled the kitchen of the Grand Hall.
With her gaze following the swirling java, her thoughts wandered to the previous night.
More specifically, she zeroed in on the sleepless hours during which she’d mopped the kitchen floor, refolded all the towels, sheets, and blankets in both linen closets in her house, watched reruns of her favorite sitcoms from the seventies until she was sure her eyes would bleed and she couldn’t stop singing Welcome Back, and basically did everything in her power not to give into the irresistible draw of sleep-to and including rearranging everything in the kitchen cabinets.
Sure, she was tired. More to the point, she was absolutely exhausted, but she couldn’t take a chance that once asleep, she would dream.
She just couldn’t do it. Not until she understood why ‘it’ kept happening.
Why did she keep dreaming of an absolutely drop-dead gorgeous man with long red hair and gorgeous Emerald eyes?
It didn’t matter that he was covered in dried mud and needed a shower and a shave; it was the fact that he begged her for help as if she was all that stood between him and certain death.
Drenched in feelings of dread and hopelessness she instantly knew were not her own, tears had filled her eyes as his deep, rumbling brogue beseeched, “Please, Mo gràidh. Please.”
Flipping her long, brown braid over her shoulder, Tamsyn mentally walked back through the last dream she’d had…
The one from three nights before, when she hadn’t been able to stay awake…
The one that had been so powerful, so heartbreaking, that when she woke up, she was on the deck behind her house, putting on her mud boots, and all she had on was her daddy’s old football T-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts.
“Sleepwalking,” she huffed under her breath.
“The last time you did that was three days after your thirteenth birthday, which just happened to be twenty-four hours before your first Shift,” Bridgette, the Bobcat Queen with whom she shared her soul, chimed in.
“And I had yet to be called into action. Since I’ve been around, your nights have been pretty uneventful, much to my chagrin. ”
“Alright, Hot Momma, that’s about enough outta you. No comments about my love life, please. I…” “Love life? What love life?”
Continuing as if the Bobcat with whom she shared her soul hadn’t spoken, Tamsyn’s tone grew snarkier.
“…I’m too tired and there’s not enough coffee in the whole world to deal with your commentary on my life choices right now.
And, if everything’s been so hunky dory since you’ve been on active duty, as you call it, how did that bullshit the other night happen?
We’ve been together for a couple of centuries, Bridge.
How did I make it all the way through the house and outside, and you were still purring in your sleep? ”
“Girl, I’ve got no freakin’ clue.” The honesty of her response was loud and clear. “I woke up the same time you did, remember?”
“How could I forget? We both gasp so hard I got lightheaded.” Tamsyn blew out an exasperated breath.
“I just keep thankin’ the Great Goddess that none of those crazy teenagers who are always running through the fields ‘hunting ghosts’ were out that night.
Can you even imagine if one of them had told their parents that I was out on the porch in my jammies?
They already think I’m too young to be Queen of the Pride and that I might not have all my dragons in a row. If they knew what I'd done…”
“Did you just say dragons in a row?”
The barely contained snicker in Bridgette’s voice stopped Tamsyn mid-sentence. Thinking back through her last comment, she slowly replied, “I-I sure did. Wonder why.”
“Well, some might call it Freudian,” Bridgette chuckled, the sound more like a hiccupping purr as it gained momentum.
“And I might just tell you to hush up.”
“Something's just never changed.”
“And others refuse to stay the same.” Raising her gaze, Tamsyn looked out the window and got as far as, “And that is what’s got me…”
When an overly cheerful, rumbling baritone called out, “Yo, Tams. We’re here.”
“We’re?” Out of her chair and on her feet, she got as far as turning around before Luke walked into the kitchen.
Eyes instantly going to the man behind him, a familiarity unlike anything she’d ever experienced slammed into her like a freight train barreling down the tracks at top speed.
About an inch taller than Luke’s six-foot-eight, his shoulders were broad, his biceps pushed the fabric of his polo shirt as far as it would go, and his chest filled out the rest to perfection.
His crystal blue eyes swirled with an Ancient Magic that somehow called to her own.
Power-Elemental, profound, and Primordial rolled off him, filling not only Tamsyn and Bridgette but every nook and cranny of the kitchen in the Grand Hall.
Hand moving towards his while her brain– and Bridgette– were trying to make sense of the sudden affinity she felt for the stranger, Tamsyn shuddered when flesh met flesh.
A flash of the man from her dreams superimposed over the stranger.
So close, yet not identical. Same eyes. Same high cheekbones and strong jaw.
Same regal stance. Same auburn hair, except that the man standing before her was graying at the temples, and the one from her dreams was not.
The word brothers floated through her mind at precisely the same time that Bridgette sighed, “Well, crap, he’s not the one. He’s not your dream guy. There’s va-va, but no voom. So close, yet so far.” Pausing, she nodded. “I think you might just be right. They might just be brothers.”
Before the Bobcat Queen could respond, Luke cheerfully introduced, “Tamsyn Ryder, this is Carrick, the Leader of the Golden Fire Clan of Dragons. He and a few of his Guardsmen have come to help with the evacuation. Isn’t that great?”
Nodding as she tried to find her voice, Tamsyn just barely held back her gasp when the Dragon Leader’s grip tightened ever so slightly as he asked, “It’s a pleasure, Ms. Ryder, but I must ask, have we met before?
” “What was that you were sayin’ about getting’ your Dragons in a row? ” “Shut up, Bridgette…”